EXCLUSIVE: Casper Woman’s Rape Claim Will Not Be Prosecuted

The Natrona County District Attorney's Office will not prosecute a man accused of a raping a Casper woman because investigators found serious problems with the woman's story.

In a memorandum sent Monday from the district attorney's office to the detective that investigated the case, Assistant District Attorney Michael W. Schafer says, "Based on the totality of the evidence gathered by the CPD, there is insufficient proof that Joseph Ramirez sexually assaulted [Aimee Kidd]."

Kidd tearfully and forcefully damned the report.

"This document is full of s--t. He lied. It's his word against mine. And half the things that are stated in that document are not true," Kidd said.

"I just feel like I'm basically being called a liar, and like it never happened," she said.

"And in the meantime I have this little baby that DNA confirms is his. And because he's saying that I willingly slept with him, and I didn't. It's just done with, it goes away, like it never happened. And now I get labeled a liar, like a false accusation and that's not true at all. And half of that letter is his word against mine. It's b------t."

The case began March 12, 2016, when Kidd contacted the Casper Police Department, and reported Ramirez sexually assaulted her in the early morning hours of Jan. 30, 2016, according to the memorandum.

Kidd said on the evening on Jan. 29, 2016, she went out with two friends and met Ramirez at the Hideaway Bar. She had two beers before going out, and one more at the bar.

Ramirez arrived some 20 minutes after Kidd, and sat with her and her friends. He was also hanging around with another man.

Kidd reportedly said Ramirez wanted to head to another bar so he could sing karaoke. Kidd was reluctant since she didn't frequent other bars, she said, but agreed to go with him.

They were only at the second bar for a short time before going to a third bar, where Kidd had another beer at about midnight before feeling dizzy and tired.

Kidd said she recalled nothing after that moment and said the rest of her knowledge of what took place afterward would be "hear [sic] say."

She reportedly woke up the next morning, naked from the waist down, with no recollection of how she got home or who undressed her. She said it was unusual for her to sleep partially nude, but she didn't think anything of it at first.

Kidd said she had a "debilitating headache" -- which she reportedly described as the worst hangover she ever had -- and was confused because she only remembered drinking four or five beers, according to the memorandum.

Kidd reportedly messaged Ramirez the next day. He commented about staying the night at her place; she was surprised but did not go into detail as to why or where he slept at her house.

She also reported that she continued to see Ramirez, but only as a friend. She told police she would never have had an intimate relationship.

Kidd learned she was pregnant on March 3, 2016.

"[Kidd] believes that when she found out she was pregnant and DNA confirmed Ramirez was the father, she was sexually assaulted and was drugged by someone and she did not consent," the memo reads. Schafer notes, however, that Kidd could not say what happened or how she might have been drugged.

Kidd said she tried to learn from Ramirez what happened to her: "And in that document where I said, 'I know you would never slip me anything,' that was me trying to get any information I could 'cause I was so devastated, like, 'what did you do to me? What happened?'"

A detective interviewed Ramirez on Feb. 3, 2017. Ramirez said he met Kidd for the first time on Jan. 2, nearly a month before the night Kidd says she met Ramirez and he sexually assaulted her at his house.

The first time they met, also at the Horseshoe Bar, Ramirez said he and Kidd talked about their work and shared other personal information.

Ramirez said Kidd then approached him after she finished dancing and gave him a kiss. Before she left, Ramirez reportedly asked for and received another kiss.

Kidd told Ramirez to get ahold of her via Facebook, Ramirez told the detective, which he did.

"Text messages and detail contained in his statement confirm he met [Kidd] the first time on January 2," Schafer writes in the memorandum. "This information that they initially met on January 2nd, and not on the evening of January 30th, is problematic for [Kidd's] memory or credibility."

Ramirez told the detective on Jan. 11 he reached out to Kidd on Facebook, and they started messaging each other.

Then on Jan. 29, 2016, Ramirez got a message from Kidd, who said she was at the Hideaway Bar. Ramirez says when he arrived around 11 p.m. that night, Kidd was sitting with a police officer's wife and a man.

Ramirez said he thought Kidd and Dave were "pretty hammered," seeing whiskey shots, tequila shots and beers on the table.

According to Ramirez's account of the evening, Kidd then got into an argument with a man whom she accused of killing her "baby's daddy" and selling drugs.

The bartender reportedly told Kidd to settle down several times before asking Ramirez to take her out of the bar. That's when, Ramirez says, he took Kidd to another bar.

Police interviewed the bartender, who reportedly confirmed there was an altercation between Kidd and another patron, the memorandum says.

At the second bar, Kidd and Ramirez shared a pitcher of beer before ordering a second pitcher. Ramirez says Kidd hid the second pitcher under her coat, and the pair left.

They then drove to the Horseshoe Bar, where Ramirez said he and Kidd were kissing and "kind of making out." Ramirez and Kidd had pictures taken of themselves, and Ramirez provided printed copies of the photos to the detective.

The memo says Kidd did not provide information about the photos when she spoke with the detective on April 15, 2016. Ramirez said Kidd posted the photos on her Facebook timeline, but later took them down.

"The photos taken do illustrate that each of the two individuals involved were being flirtatious with each other and interacting in a way that could be perceived as something more than a friendly relationship," Schafer writes in the memo.

Kidd says she took them down because they disgusted her.

Schafer says Ramirez's statement indicates that when he and Kidd arrived at Kidd's home, she asked Ramirez if he was spending the night and he said he would. After using the bathroom, Ramirez walked into Kidd's bedroom, crawled into bed with her, and had consensual sex, Ramirez told the detective.

But that portion of Ramirez's statement is contradicted by a friend of Kidd's who had been drinking with the pair and went to Kidd's house with them that night. The group arrived at Kidd's house at roughly 2:30 a.m.

Kidd's friend said Ramirez asked if Kidd wanted him to go home, or if he could spend the night. Ramirez reportedly said if he spent the night, they could "just cuddle." Kidd, her friend told police, did not respond.

Kidd's friend said she though Kidd went to the bathroom and then into her bedroom. As the friend was leaving, Ramirez said something -- which the friend could not recall -- to her.

The friend replied that Kidd's child slept in Kidd's bed with her. Ramirez reportedly responded, "Well, I'm just going to cuddle with her." The friend said she saw Kidd get into bed with her child, and Ramirez was walking toward the room as Kidd's friend left.

In the memo, Schafer says the friend's story "confirms Ramirez may be lying about [the child] being in the bedroom with Kidd when he entered." It also confirms that Ramirez was not being secret about wanting to spend the night with Kidd and wanting to crawl into bed with her, Schafer says.

In his interview with the detective, Ramirez provided several messages confirming the communication he had with Kidd the next day. Several of those messages contained information that he had slept in her bed.

"This information confirms that Ramirez was not hiding the fact that he had slept with Kidd," Schafer writes. "Armed with this information, Kidd did not communicate or stress to Ramirez that she was not at all interested in sleeping with him and she did not want to have an intimate relationship with him."

"Much of the information gathered as part of the investigation indicated just the opposite, that there was a continuing, somewhat intimate, relationship that occurred between January 30, 2016 and early March, 2016.

Ramirez reportedly provided text messages which purportedly showed he and Kidd continued to have a relationship through the following weeks. Schafer writes, "They were messaging each other in a flirtatious manner, spending time together, and going out on dates."

Kidd did not -- or could not -- provide that information to the detective.

Kidd's cell phone was collected for a download, so detectives could search for evidence of communications between Kidd and Ramirez. No pertinent photos were found, but, Schafer writes, "there are filtered messages filed that did not include some messages sent by [Kidd], which leads one to believe there are missing messages that were deleted."

While their stories differ in many respects, Kidd and Ramirez both told police they spent another night together at Kidd's house a few days after Jan. 30, 2016. They went out to several bars, with Kidd saying Ramirez asked to stay at her place. She said she didn't care, "whatever," according to the memo.

The next morning, Kidd says she woke up to Ramirez in her bed "trying to do stuff" with her. She said he was kissing her, undressed from the waist down and trying to have sex with her.

Kidd said "no" and told Ramirez to get off her, she told police. She told a detective she got up to use the bathroom, and that's how she got away from him.

Ramirez, Kidd says, got mad and left. She said she didn't want to do much with him after that.

Ramirez told police he and Kidd started to have sex the previous night before Kidd said she just wanted to cuddle, according to the memo. The next morning, Ramirez began kissing Kidd and they started to have sex again, he says. But Kidd then said she needed to use the bathroom and went into the living room.

"The fact that [Kidd] did not report this incident to police is problematic in that it is not significantly different than the event on January 30, 2016," Schafer writes. "It is also troubling that, even though she states she did not want a relationship with Mr. Ramirez, even after this event, there is more credible information that they continued to text each other, communicate and spend time together."

Ramirez admitted to detectives he started seeing his ex-girlfriend, Tina Tallman, in early February.

For Valentine's Day, Ramirez bought a Texas sweatshirt and a stuffed bear for Kidd. He bought the same gift for Tallman, and he says Tallman found out. Ramirez says it was around that time when Kidd started acting hateful.

Tallman pressed a domestic battery charge against Ramirez for an alleged assault that occurred in August. A jury of three men and three women found Ramirez not guilty in early February.

Kidd reportedly called Ramirez during the first week of March and told him she was pregnant, adding she was trying to figure out who the father was, according to the memo.

Ramirez said he would "help her out" regardless of who the father was.

Kidd reportedly asked Ramirez whether anyone may have drugged her on the night of Jan. 29, saying she had been "trashed" before but would still remember everything.

Ramirez told detectives that was the first time Kidd ever mentioned anything like that to him about that night.

Facebook messages regarding the pregnancy, dated March 3, are cited in the memorandum.

"Several of the statements provided by witnesses and evidence in the form of messaging indicated that Mr. Ramirez believed he was in an intimate relationship with [Aimee Kidd]," the memorandum reads. "Ms. Kidd did not stop Ramirez or communicate to him that she was not interested in him intimately."

"It wasn't until [Kidd] learned she was pregnant and that Mr. Ramirez was seeing another woman that she communicated she did not want anything to do with him," Schafer continues.

The memo also addresses the issue posed by Kidd's lack of recollection of the night of Jan. 29, 2016, due to intoxication.

"The fact that [Kidd] does not recollect the events of January 30, 2016, does not establish proof that she was physically helpless at the time the intercourse occurred," Schafer says. "In addition, there is no proof that Mr. Ramirez or somebody else administered, without the knowledge of [Kidd], a substance which substantially impaired her ability to control his conduct."

"In fact, there is a message [Kidd] wrote to Mr. Ramirez that says, 'I know u didn't slip me anything,'" Schafer writes in the memo. "The only other individual who could have slipped [Kidd] a date rape drug has been interviewed and denies doing any such thing."

Schafer also says Kidd did not disclose certain facts to police that illustrated her "ongoing, somewhat intimate" relationship with Ramirez. There are a number of photographs, messages and witness statements illustrating day-to-day contact between the two, the memorandum says.

"It is also strange in later conversations between Ramirez and [Kidd] that [Kidd] claimed she didn't remember having sex with Mr. Ramirez when she learned she was pregnant, then sent Mr. Ramirez a photo of the ultra sound," Schafer writes.

"Should you obtain any additional evidence in the future that could change this opinion, please submit that evidence to this office and this decision will be reconsidered," the memo concludes.

Kidd has been one of several outspoken critics of the Casper Police Department and its handling of sexual assault investigations.

"Law enforcement in Casper is very well-known for their aggressive stance on sexual assault and abuse," says Donald Fuller, defense attorney for Ramirez. "They have a high prosecution rate and a high conviction rate."

"Their work in this case is remarkable and extensive," Fuller adds. "Even when faced with political pressures to conduct a witch hunt, the facts are that Aimee Kidd lied."

It's possible that the district attorney's office may discover new evidence and decide to bring a case against Ramirez. But in the meantime, Ramirez will try to repair his reputation -- though Fuller says Ramirez is certainly "no saint."

Even so, "Now he has been accused falsely of a sexual assault and falsely of being an informant for the federal government," Fuller says, "both of which have been proven to be false."